Archived Reports: 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005:

December 20 2008

I took the new boat out in some very cold weather and figured I would look around for a few Steelhead. Guess what I found and it didn't take long to find the first one. The roads have been very bad getting over here and there has been no boats on the river. Right now we have about four inches of snow on the ground and packed ice on the roads so I would imagine that the pressure will be light again. I think I will go spend a quiet day on the river as trips have been cancelled due to weather. Good luck out there and be safe as it is not worth risking your life to try and catch a fish.

We just received our new 17' x 60" Willie Boat that we will be fishing beginning this season.  Below is a picture of the new boat and you will notice it's a familiar blue.  We will be making some customizations to the boat before it hits the water.  Tim Barnett

December 6 2008

Thank god this salmon season is over. Earlier this year ODFW imposed reduced bag limits for the fall season and they were spot on. Early in the season there were a good number of fish around and it seemed as they had shot us in the foot but in hindsight I'm glad they did as this will help insure enough escapement for our runs in the next three to five years. For the people I cancelled I'm sorry but I just couldn't take your money and that's what I would have been doing most of the time. The fishing was a crap shoot with the fish showing up sporadically some days it was good and the next it was a ghost town. Enough of that. On the bright side the Coho showed up in force which is a very good indication of what our Steelhead run will look like this winter. The Steelhead have been showing up in good numbers this year already with a good amount of wild fish in the mix. I'm really looking forward to this as it's my favorite time of the year. Tim

October 19 2008

The Chinook are starting to show up but not in big numbers yet. They are enough to fish for if you put your time in and know where to go. We have had some huge tides the last few days and there has been a few decent bites in tidewater as well as some fish that made it into the river. Some days it has been pretty good with the next being dead. When fishing without a lot of fish the importance of good bait and presentation is key to success. My best day we had fourteen fish hooked and the next we hooked one with only two bites so it is all over the place. Look for it to get better with the coming rains. A good note is that the other day two of the fish we landed were fin clipped. Good luck

October 7, 2008

The fish are starting to show up. The recent rains have brought some fish into the river as well as some jacks. Look for things to improve with the next rains as the last rise in the river cleaned the dark fish out of tidewater as well as brought in some fresh ones. I will start fishing later this week as late summer and early fall is the only time of the year I get a chance to vacation. The wife and I went to Yellowstone sight seeing and I went fly fishing for Eastslope Cutthroats it was a blast. I also hunt from late August to early October. Enjoy the pictures.Tim

July 4 2008

Well I can say Alaska is the most gorgeous place I have ever saw. The fishing was great as well for kings,sockeye,artic char and pike. I spent some time fishing out of Bear Bay Lodge as well as the salmon camp on the Nushagak River. The Kings on the Nush are the meanest I have ever caught as most will jump after hooked and you will get several line peeling runs. These fish are very aggressive biters with doubles being the norm, and triples being very common. I had a few run ins with the local wildlife as well with the moose being in camp every afternoon. I also had a couple of close encounters with the furred kind. I didn't get a picture of the most aggressive one as I was looking at the sights of a hand gun and was a little preoccupied with the event to be multitasking with a camera in one hand and gun in the other. I will write more of my time up there later. Right now there is a fair amount of summer Steelhead in the river and I just might go catch a few this weekend. Tim

June 5, 2008

The spring Chinook are starting to show up in fishable numbers in all the rivers over here now. I will not be fishing this season as I leave for Alaska early Saturday morning so you guys have a ball. The wife will be monitoring the email so if you have specific dates you want for the fall ask for them. If you aren't sure of a date she will respond and put you on the list and I  will call you to discuss the dates available when I get back. Good fishing! Tim Barnett

May 13, 2008

Well its been a while since I have had time to take care of the site as I have been going non stop since January. As I said earlier this year I was offered a job in Alaska and I accepted which meant I had to either get my captains lic. or get a western rivers lic. which would do me no good down here so I chose the captains lic. That left me studying every waking moment then driving to San Francisco to take the test. Boy that was the easy part as I had to jump through a lot of hoops up here to get all the requirements filled for the coast guard to submit my app. Now the wait continues. Enough of that. We had a pretty good year steelheading with no skunked trips for the whole season. We had a couple of close calls as we fought the seals off and on most of the spring but always managed to catch some fish. This was the year of big fish as we landed six fish over twenty pounds including a twenty one pound brute to finish the season off. I will fish for about two weeks for spring Chinook  before I leave for Alaska on the sixth of June. There are some fish starting to show up now with some summer steelhead so things are looking better than last year at this time. Good fishing

The Nestucca dropped into pretty good shape last week and was very generous with the amount of fish it produced. The run this year has put out a lot of big fish as most of the coastal rivers have. I am hearing the rivers down in northern California haven't been as fortunate as we have up here for some reason which is to bad. The typical methods are producing  as usual with drift fishing rags and eggs being my go to method of choice. It allows you to slow the presentation down for the cold water and with the lower visability it gives you more chances to get the bait close enough to the fish for them to see it. With side drifting you only get the one shot unless you are in a run that you can row back up to get another pass through. I made some changes this last year with the line I use being the biggest. I switched to P-Line for my Chinook fishing last fall using Spectrex for the bobbers and back bouncing and Cxx Extra strong for the plugs when needed and can't say enough about how strong and durable the stuff is. I also switched to Cx Premium in blue flourescent for the steelhead and this stuff is the best line I have ever fished on a spinning reel . The line is very small and fairly limp with great abrasion resistance and good knot strength as well very slick which makes the casting with light weights easier. The river needs to drop back down and clear up and when it does the fishing will get good again. On a side note I will be fishing for the Bear Bay Salmon Camp this summer and there is still some open dates from mid June through the first week of July. The camp is located on the Nushagak river draining into Bristol Bay and is known as the premier King Salmon fishery of the world. Inquiries can be made to myself or through the website at www.nushsalmoncamp.com   Good fishing Tim

Date January 13 2008
Current Report:

The rains have finally stopped and we saw the sun for the first time in what seemed like months and with  that the river is starting to drop. It looks like it this thing will drop into shape by thursday. I expect that the early run of alsea fish will about be done but there should be some broodstock fish to replace them. There should be a good number of wild fish as well as these numbers were starting to build before the rains began. I would expect that there will be a lot of pressure as no one has been able to fish for a month and everyone has cabin fever. Lets all be nice out there and respect each others space. Tim

Date: January 9 2008
Current Report:

The river is currently out of shape do to the heavy rain and snow melt. The rivers have been falling just about into shape and then we get another storm and out they go. The plus side of this if there is one is the early native populations that have been rebounding over the last several years will not see the divers and bait that some people continue to use. I have tried to politely educate some of these guys by showing them how to catch these things in a less lethal way. I have been met by mixed responses, some are glad to get shown a very effective way to fish that is more fun for the angler than sitting in a boat watching a rod hoping it will fold. The others could care less that they will kill most of the fish caught this way even though the wild fish have to be released anyway. This is the type of thinking that helped get us to where we are now. The early fish are now in the upper river where it is artificial only. Lets all hope for a little less rain. Tim 

Date January 3 2008
Current Report:

The river finally dropped enough to get out on the first. There was plenty of others out a well. We started the day out with a fish in the twenty three to twenty four pound range this was about as big of steelhead as I have ever saw to bad the picture didn't do it justice. This was a good way to start out 2008.

We also caught three hatchery fish as well. The wind made it pretty hard to fish the rest of the day as it blew about thirty miles per hour down stream all day long. The rains came back and the river is on the rise again. Tim